Changes to the Ontario Rules of Civil Procedure Forms
The following is copied from an Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General, Court Services Division Directive and may be of interest.
An amendment to Rule 1.06 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, which removes RCP forms from the Rules and incorporates them by reference to a website, comes into effect on July 1, 2006. This change, made by O. Reg.77/06, moves the forms from the body of the Rules to the following public website: http://www.ontariocourtforms.on.ca. The forms will no longer be published on the “e-laws” website. The regulation also includes a new Table of Forms that gives the Form Number, Form Title and Date of Form.
Each form is now available on this public website as a separate document in HTML and/or Microsoft Word. The format of these forms is not in compliance with Rule 4 that governs the format of court documents. It is a party’s responsibility to ensure that any form they file complies with the Rules of Civil Procedure, e.g. Rule 4.01 (formatting).
An added identifier appears at the end of each form and comprises two elements: A form code, e.g., RCP-E 4A, and a version date, e.g. November 1, 2005. At present, the civil forms share a common version date since they were incorporated by reference at the same time. In future, the version date of a form will depend on the date it is either amended, replaced by a new form, or added.
No changes were made to the substance of the forms. There are no new or amended forms.
Thanks kindly to Diane Rooke, Reference Librarian at the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General Law Library for passing along this information and giving permission to re-post it here.
The Ministry directive (above) thoughtfully notes that “the format of these forms is not in compliance with Rule 4 that governs the format of court documents”.
On the new court forms website itself, the introduction to the forms is less direct: “It is your responsibility to ensure that your form complies with the Rules of Civil Procedure (see for example R. 4.01 with respect to formatting). Many of the Rules of Civil Procedure forms contain the phrase (General heading). General headings are separate forms under the Rules of Civil Procedure and must be inserted where this phrase appears, with the proper content.”
When I first saw this posting, my attention was drawn to the fact that forms in Word format were being made available to all, which I assumed was a positive development. As I reflect further, I’m not clear on why these Word forms have been posted on the web.
Is it expected that these forms will be used by self-represented litigants (who probably will not heed the advice to check out Rule 4 format requirements). Is it expected that lawyers will use these forms? IF so, was it necessary to explain that the word “heading” was not part of the form but a place holder for the proper style of cause? Is it clear that the content of this website will be updated as soon as there are changes to the Rules? Is this website more of a “trap for the unwary”?
Thank you for your thoughtful analysis, Elizabeth. I posted it without comment partly to notify people of the change, and partly to see if there would be any cries of protest. My concern is that the Ontario government is pulling out parts of regulations (again) and making them available from “third parties”. In this case the third party is the government itself. However, there is little to regulate how these third party documents are made accessible to practitioners and the public, as you have illustrated. At least when they were in the regulations we could trace the changes through the indexing.
I think most respectable Ontario law firms will be creating their own version of the forms and updating them themselves.
Re: Elizabeth Ellis’ comment, “Is it expected that these forms will be used by self-represented litigants (who probably will not heed the advice to check out Rule 4 format requirements)…”
There are some good studies that have good suggestions for avoiding this this sort of pitfall:
Self-Represented Litigants in Nova Scotia Needs Assessment Study, Anna Paton, March 2004,
Self-Represented Litigants in the Yukon Territory: A Report on Their Number and Unmet Needs J. Furniss, 2002,
and in general,
The Self Represented Litigant in the Courts: An Annotated Bibliography, Maria Barrett-Morris, Mike Aujla, Hugh F. Landerkin, 2004.